The final text of the global agreement out of COP24 lacked the urgency many climate campaigners were hoping for. (Photo: @CANEurope/Twitter)

Climate action groups slammed the outcome of the 24th annual Conference of the Parties (COP24) in Katowice, Poland on Saturday, calling the agreement reached by about 200 diplomats and negotiators “barely adequate” as a plan to ensure that countries will follow through with their emissions reduction pledges.

Concluding two weeks of talks on how countries can implement the Paris climate agreement to keep global warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit), the diplomats reached a deal standardizing how countries measure their carbon emissions and ostensibly ensuring that world leaders will be more aggressive in reaching their emissions targets in time for the next global summit next September.

The final agreement left out directives on specific reductions in emissions by 2030. While it calls on wealthier countries to clarify how they will provide aid to less well-off nations, many of which are on the front lines of the climate crisis, more in-depth talks about developing countries needs were put off until next year.

Advocates for bold, concrete reforms and directives—outlined in the People’s Demands for Climate Justice—said the required sense of urgency for avoiding the climate catastrophe that the world’s top scientists warn could take hold by 2030, was missing from the deal.

“The weak outcome of this COP runs contrary to stark warnings of the IPCC report and growing demand for action from citizens,” said Wendel Trio, director of Climate Action Network (CAN) Europe. “Governments have again delayed adequate action to avoid catastrophic climate breakdown. The EU needs to push ahead and lead by example, by providing more support to poor countries and increasing its climate pledge before the UN Secretary General Summit in September 2019. It must be a significant increase, even beyond the 55 percent reduction some Member States and the European Parliament are calling for.”

The inadequate agreement, said the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), was the result not of a lack of understanding at COP24, but a lack of political will.

“There was clear recognition in Katowice that the world needs to get on a low-carbon pathway as soon as possible to meet the steep, near-term emission cuts the IPCC report indicated are needed by 2030,” said Rachel Cleetus, an economist at UCS. “Once again, developed countries failed to provide assurances that they would make sufficient, predictable funding available for least developed nations to help them cope with climate impacts, including the loss and damage they already face, as well as ramp up low-carbon technologies.

“People expected action and that is what governments did not deliver. This is morally unacceptable.” —Jennifer Morgan, Greenpeace International“The barely adequate outcome in Katowice means there’s much work ahead to ensure countries live up to their responsibilities to put more ambitious action on the table by 2020,” she added.

“Without immediate action, even the strongest rules will not get us anywhere,” said Jennifer Morgan, executive director of Greenpeace International. “People expected action and that is what governments did not deliver. This is morally unacceptable and they must now carry with them the outrage of people and come to the UN Secretary General’s summit in 2019 with higher climate action targets.”

The summit was deeply flawed from the start, with climate action groups and young demonstrators slamming the United Nations for holding the annual climate talks in the center of Poland’s coal country and President Donald Trump for sending pro-fossil fuel representatives to speak for the U.S., the world’s second-largest emitter of carbon.

The global justice group Corporate Accountability blamed the looming presence of the coal industry at the global summit, and world leaders’ refusal to fully extricate themselves from the interests of fossil fuel industries, for the inadequate outcome of COP24—but noted that around the world, young climate activists like Greta Thunberg and the Sunrise Movement are not backing down in their campaigns to hold governments accountable for avoiding a climate catastrophe.

“The lack of action at the hands of industry forces, and the governments doing their bidding, is further igniting a movement of people and governments who are demanding that Big Polluters be barred from the UNFCCC once and for all,” said Patti Lynn, the group’s executive director. “The movement to kick the fossil fuel industry out has never been stronger.”

“In Poland, there’s a clear rift between political elites who are guilty of a lack of ambition and are supporting the continued use of coal while people are calling for strong climate action,” said Greenpeace Poland campaigner Pawel Szypulski. “Two out of three Poles support a coal phase-out by 2030. The science is clear, we’ve got 12 years left and the technical means to avoid catastrophe. Now politicians need to listen and act.”

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KATOWICE, POLAND – Reiterating the concerns of constituents across the United States whose health and safety is threatened by fossil fuel production and worsening impacts from climate change, more than 300 mayors, state representatives, and elected officials from 40 states released a letter today calling for a nationwide plan to phase out the production and use of fossil fuels and to ramp up renewable energy as part of a green new deal approach to energy and efficiency.

“As the world gathers in Poland for the climate talks, it’s imperative that we take the action here at home that really leads the nation and the world,” said Maryland State Delegate Joseline Peña-Melnyk. “It’s time to end the era of fossil fuel production and build our clean energy future together.”

Elected Officials to Protect America (EOPA) released the letter as is a growing initiative of state representatives, mayors, country supervisors, and city council members from across the nation that are demanding an end to the use of dirty fossil fuels that harm their communities.

“Climate change is the most serious threat to the future of humanity, and we have failed to respond with the urgency needed,” said John Marty, State Senator in Minnesota. “It’s time for a strong, consistent, and aggressive response in order to become a 100% fossil fuel-free society.”

In light of unprecedented devastation from wildfires in California, destructive hurricanes in North Carolina to Puerto Rico to Hawaii, droughts, and extreme weather throughout the US, the elected officials are urging their peer elected officials across the nation to end permitting for new fossil fuel projects and phase out oil and gas production within a 2,500-foot buffer zone of vulnerable communities, halt public investments and subsidies of fossil fuels, and move swiftly to 100% clean energy.

“The existence of climate change and its potential disastrous impacts have been known for decades. The solutions, primary among which is elimination of the use of fossil fuels, have also been known,” said L.W. Allstadt, Trustee of Cooperstown, New York and former executive vice president of Mobil Oil. “We need to take action now, or we will be condemning our children and grandchildren to the severe physical and societal impacts of climate change and the exorbitant costs of trying to deal with them.”

Drafted by state and local elected officials from across the country at the Global Action Climate Summit in San Francisco in September and launched at the United Nations climate talks in Poland on Thursday, the letter cites the increasingly serious local impacts of climate change and harm to public health throughout America from the production and burning of fossil fuels, including pollution, water contamination, leaks, explosions and other dangers.

“The most important job of local leaders is to keep their communities safe,” said Meghan Sahli-Wells, Vice Mayor of Culver City, California. “The only way we can ensure the health and safety of our constituents is to end fossil fuel production in our communities, and transition to a just, clean, sustainable future.”

The Universal Ecological Fund report have found that climate change is already costing the U.S. economy $240 billion annually from storms, droughts, fires, and sea level rise cost their communities.

“North Dakota is the breadbasket of the world,” said Tim Mathern, State Senator in North Dakota. “I don’t want climate change to make it the great American dessert.”

The impacts of climate change threaten public safety in communities across the nation, particularly in low-income communities. Vulnerable communities will see an increase in poor air quality, infectious disease, and a decrease in food safety which will exacerbate social inequalities.

“There is no single more important issue that addressing climate change for our municipality, nation, and planet, period,” said Peter Swiderski, Mayor of Hastings-on-Hudson, New York. “This is a global emergency.”

By 2090, a scenario of uncontrolled emissions will cause temperature related health impacts of $140 billion annually and $160 billion in lost wages. Outbreaks of infectious diseases like West Nile could even result in a $3.3 billion increase in annual hospitalization costs by 2100.

“Maine has some of the highest rates of asthma in the country because we at the end of the ‘tailpipe’ of the nation,” said Samantha Paradis, Mayor of Belfast, Maine. “We need bold climate leadership to protect the health of the public, the economy, and our beautiful landscape.”

The officials are calling for supporting and retraining fossil fuel energy workers in the clean energy economy and ensuring investment in good, family-supporting jobs in renewable energy like solar, wind, and geothermal. These will lead to more sustainable, long-term employment and create hundreds of thousands of new jobs.

“We must protect our planet through actions big and small to wean ourselves from fossil fuels. There is no greater imperative,” said Catherine Blakespear, Mayor of Encinitas, California. “We have the technology to thrive and prosper without oil and gas drilling but we need the will to make it happen.”

The letter builds on a letter from more than 250 elected officials from a majority of counties in California urging Governor Jerry Brown to phase out fossil fuel production in the state. The letter contributed to Governor Brown signing bill SB 100 into law, requiring California’s electricity to come from 100% renewable sources by 2045.

“We should all be alarmed at the increase in carbon emissions and rapid rate of climate change posing an imminent existential threat to all living things on our planet. We must act quickly, boldly, and decisively to address this critical threat,” said Marina Khubesrian, Mayor of South Pasadena, California. “This includes how we power our cars, homes, and factories for starters.”

The Global Climate Action Summit that Governor Brown and former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg convened was blockaded by protesters, chanting “climate leaders don’t frack or drill oil.” Following on dozens of events across the country, the network of officials is pointing to community concerns.

“By committing to this effort jurisdiction by jurisdiction, starting today, we will make a real difference,“ said Michael Dembrow, Oregon State Senator.

The National Climate Assessment released November 2018 projects that economic damages from climate change could lead to annual losses of $100 billion in various economic sectors. By the end of the century, current rates of warming will cost the US economy $500 billion a year in crop damage, labor losses, and damage from increasingly extreme weather — double the economic consequence of the Great Recession. The Assessment predicts economic losses will exceed the GDP of many states.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report released on October 8th warns that to maintain global temperature rise below 1.5℃, far-reaching and unprecedented changes must be made in all aspects of society, including halting the production and burning of fossil fuels. Human CO2 emissions need to fall 45% by 2030.

ADDITIONAL QUOTES:

New York State Senator Krueger: “As elected officials, our first responsibility is to look after the safety, security, and health of the people we represent. There is no question that climate change is the greatest threat to our constituents’ well-being, not to mention our economy and the very stability of our civilization. When it comes to tackling climate change, the question is not how much we’ve done compared to others, but whether what we have done matches what science tells us is necessary. The time has come to make commitments that are bold yet entirely realistic, to safeguard a livable climate for ourselves, our children, and our grandchildren.”

“Scientific studies overwhelmingly agree on the terrible consequences that climate change will produce if we don’t drastically reduce our dependence on fossil fuels,” said Michael Yantachka, Vermont State Representative. “We can’t wait any longer to take action that should have been taken a decade ago. The time is now.”

“With the most intense wildfires in history preceded by a long drought, climate change cannot be denied in California,” said Eduardo Martinez, Councilmember in Richmond, California, home of the large Chevron oil refinery. “These extreme weather events will continue to increase if we do not act now to lower carbon emissions.”

“Climate change is the top threat to our safety, our infrastructure, our way of life,” said Patrick Wojahn, Mayor of College Park, Maryland. “It’s time to stop talking about it and start taking bold actions to do something about it.”

Tim Goodrich, Councilmember in Torrance, California said, “As a military veteran of the conflicts in the Middle East, the threat of climate change is about more than the air we breathe, it’s also a threat to our national security.”

Paul Feiner, Town Supervisor, Greenburgh, New York, “I am pleased that officials at every level of government are joining forces and fighting to take action to preserve our planet. IF we don’t act now the quality of life for our children, grandchildren and their children will be greatly reduced. We must act now. This is not a Democratic or Republican issue. It’s a planet issue.”

“Wisconsin is feeling the effects of climate change in force when in August we saw historic, catastrophic flooding across the state, costing at least $44 million — a financial burden that Wisconsinites will bear for decades to come,” said Kate Beaton, Councilmember in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. “Wisconsin families are still mourning this tragedy and we owe it to them to take this as a wakeup call and act on climate change right now.”

“With the undeniable and devastating effects of fire, flood and record breaking heat, we can do longer be idle while the federal government closes its eyes to real science on climate change,” said J.R. Roberts, Mayor Pro Tem of Palm Springs, California. “If we don’t act locally and soon, there may not be a world for our children to fight for.”

“We are at a climate crossroads. Failure to act now will have disastrous consequences for our planet and society,” said Jesse Arreguin, Mayor of Berkeley, California. “I am proud to stand with countless other elected officials in promoting strong environmental policy while urging others to follow our lead. We cannot settle for anything less.”

Josh Mandelbaum, Councilmember, Des Moines Iowa, “Our communities are increasingly impacted by severe weather events from floods to droughts. We must act. We can be part of the solution by leading the transition to a clean energy economy and creating local jobs.”

Nicola Armacost, Trustee, Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, “Federal, state and local elected officials have a moral obligation to support efforts to mitigate and adapt to climate change. We owe it to our children, our grandchildren and the generations to come.”

William Reinhardt, County Legislator, Bethlehem Albany County, New York, “This is the underlying challenge of our time. Can humanity come together and cooperate at all levels of government to avert climate disaster?”

“If we are serious about addressing climate change then we need to be serious about drafting policies that mandate the phase-out of fossil fuels,” said Daniel Lee, Councilmember in Culver City, California. “Anything less is window dressing on the porthole of a sinking ship.”

Gary Koutnik, County Representative, Otsego County, New York, “It’s time to stop playing nice. This is an emergency of historic proportions.”

J.R. Roberts, Mayor Pro Tem, Palm Springs, California, “With the undeniable and devastating effects of fire, flood and record breaking heat, we can do longer be idle while the federal government closes it’s eyes to real science on climate change. If we don’t act locally and soon, there may not be a world for our children to fight for.”

John Rizzo, Trustee of Community College Board, San Francisco, California, “Climate change will affect everyone on earth, and is already affecting millions right now. We must get serious about ending the burning of fossil fuels.”

Share Horne, Councilmember, Laguna Woods, CA “This is the most critical issue for humans and animals living on this planet.”

Carmen Ramirez, Mayor Pro Tem, Oxnard, California, “Future generations will praise or condemn us. Our legacy will be the health of the planet and all of its residents…or the dire consequences we clearly see coming if we have failed to do everything in our power to keep the world safe.””

Manna Jo Greene, Ulster County Legislator, New York, “The global climate crisis is the most pressing issue we face. By working together, we can reduce greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel and other sources and rapidly transition to a renewable energy economy, with storage and efficiency. We must also protect our farms, forests, wetlands and oceans, that can draw down carbon and other greenhouse gasses and safely store them out of harm’s way. By urgently preventing emissions and protecting ecosystems that sequester carbon, we can actually return the Earth back into balance. Climate solutions are here — we just need the personal and political will to implement them. Given the recent IPCC report, we have 11 years to do so. This is therefore the most urgent and important work we can be doing for our constituents and for future generations.”

Eduardo Martinez, Councilmember, Richmond, California,“With the most intense wild fires ever preceded by a long drought, climate change cannot be denied in California. These extreme weather events will increase if we do not act now to lower carbon emissions.”

Frank Crawford, Vice President School Board, Marysvilla Joint Unified School District, California, “After working with various groups for the Camp Fire that destroyed the city of Paradise Calif. I am convinced that climate change, combined with other factors, contributed in the total devastation of a city I once lived and interned in while attending CSUChico. This is now the time for change. Thank You.”

Meghan Kallman, Councilmember, Pawtucket, Rhode Island, “”Climate change is among the gravest threats facing not just our nation, but the entire globe. As a municipal official, I am deeply concerned about the ways that negative consequences will be experienced first in cities, including in mine. In Rhode Island, we are susceptible to flooding and hurricane damage, heat waves, and are running a grave risk of overtaxing our already-taxed infrastructure (including water and sewers). Our generation needs to step up to the plate and tackle this aggressively; we owe it to future generations to do so”.”

Brandi Merolla, Councilmember, Tusten, New York, “The time to eliminate fossil fuel use is now and the time to embrace renewable energy is now. There is no Planet B!”

Roseann Torres, Director, Oakland Board of Education, California, “We must do all we can now to protect our environment for the future generations. Kids are most affected who are poor and begin school behind their peers as a result which has lifelong negative effects.”

Barry Beck, Assessor, Mono, California, “It was recently announced that we had another record-breaking year for the release of carbon into the atmosphere, at over 37 billion tons. We have a lot less time than most people think to solve this problem that is currently on pace to lead to the 6th great extinction.”

Debora Fudge, Councilmember in Windsor California, “Climate change is the most difficult challenge facing us. Our future is in peril.”

Marina Khubesrian, Mayor of South Pasadena, California, “We should all be alarmed at the increase in carbon emissions and rapid rate of climate change posing an imminent existential threat to all living things on our planet. We must act quickly, boldly, and decisively to address this critical threat. If the planet were a patient exhibiting such dangerous vital signs, we would have her in the Critical Care Unit with a team of specialists working around the clock to save her life. We need to tap experts in Motivational Behavior Change to help our institutions overcome denial, resistance, ambivalence and inertia to move us into action on all fronts of sustainability. This includes how we power our cars, homes, and factories for starters.

Jan Pepper, Vice Mayor, Los Altos, California,“Combating climate change is essential for the survival of our planet. We all need to come together to make this happen.”

Phillip Stoddard, Mayor of South Miami, Florida, “Coastal areas are going underwater, agriculture is failing, fires are raging, the oceans are dying, insects are disappearing. Think maybe we should do something different?”

Christy Holstege, Councilmember in Palm Springs, California, “As California, our nation, and the world face the devastating damage ravaged by extreme weather events caused by climate change, like the forest fires that destroyed parts of California last month, we need to call for bold leadership to achieve 100% clean energy to protect our environment. As a millennial city councilmember for the City of Palm Springs, I know we need to take urgent action now to protect our planet for generations so that we can all enjoy safe, healthy, and equitable futures.””

Nicholas Josefowitz, BART Director, San Francisco, California, “Climate change has already started to wreck havoc on our communities. We all need to step up, take responsibility for our future, and act decisively to eliminate the carbon pollution we are responsible for. That’s why I led BART to become the first transit agency in the country to be powered by 100% renewables – creating good green jobs and saving money in the process. And that’s why I’m urging all other governments – big or small – to do the same.””

Stephen Houlahan, Councilmember in Santee, California, “The time has come for the leaders of the Earth to create a sustainable economic model that accounts for the financial impacts of climate change.”

Rebecca Kaplan, Councilmember at large, Oakland, California, “”As the city-wide elected representative of the people of Oakland, I know that some of our most struggling communities have the most to lose from the impacts of climate change and pollution. Oakland suffers a huge disproportionate share of asthma and other negative environmental impacts, and, as climate change worsens, it threatens to worsen injustice also. We must all take stronger action to protect our communities, including the most vulnerable!””

Kelly Kent, School board vice president, Culver City, California, “In Culver City, CA, our most sensitive receptors are subject to the harmful impacts of both conventional and unconventional oil drilling as we are smack in the middle of our nation’s largest urban oil field. I emphatically call on this planet’s political leaders to act like every child is their own, and to move with urgency toward phasing out the use of fossil fuels on behalf of all of our babies’ health, learning and futures.””

Danielle Adams, Soil and Water Conservation District Supervisor, Durham, North Carolina “Younger generations are looking to us for answers on why we aren’t doing more to preserve their future. The most vulnerable among us are looking to us for answers on why we aren’t fighting for the lives that are being lost today because of the impacts of climate change. When future generations look back on us how will we be judged? How can we continue knowing the real costs ahead of us and do nothing. Their are people in my community who are dying because of our inaction. The time to act isn’t now — the time to act was decades ago and we missed the mark. Now we have to do ALL that we can to save lives, adapt to the changing world around us and preserve whatever we can of the future. We have no choice but to act.”

Jeannine Pearce, City Councilmember, Long Beach (District 2), California “This is an issue that affects our communities not only physically , but it creates a financial burden to local municipalities. Without taking strategic steps to have clean energy, the increase of impacts will continue. I am proud to be part of a city that is currently working towards making Long Beach be a 100 % clean energy and environmentally sustainable city through policies such as our Clean Air Action Plan, Pier B On-Dock Rail Support Facility among others. Without a strong leadership in climate change, many green projects will not be implemented. I urge your support in taking care of our environment and most importantly our constituents. “

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350 is the red line for human beings, the most important number on the planet. The most recent science tells us that unless we can reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million, we will cause huge and irreversible damage to the earth. But solutions exist. All around the world, a movement is building to take on the climate crisis, to get humanity out of the danger zone and below 350. This movement is massive, it is diverse, and it is visionary. We are activists, scholars, and scientists. We are leaders in our businesses, our churches, our governments, and our schools. We are clean energy advocates, forward-thinking politicians, and fearless revolutionaries. And we are united around the world, driven to make our planet livable for all who come after us.

BM: You are one of the foremost critics of imperialism. Can you tell us
how you came to be who you are? Can you tell us about your formative years?

AV: Formative years… There were many of them, and actually, I feel that I am still evolving, until now. People always do, I believe and hope.

I was born in the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics, in an unbelievably beautiful city of Leningrad, built by insane Peter the Great and by a few no less insane Italian and French architects, on the shores of wide and powerful river Neva, right near the mosquito-infested swamps.

I did not live there long, just three years or so, but the city always stayed inside me.

My mother is half Russian, half Chinese, while my father is Czech, a scientist. At the age of three I was taken to a boring, industrial city of Pilsen (Plzen) in what was then Czechoslovakia; a city also known for its beer and proximity to Bavaria.

My father belongs to that old generation of scientists who believed that they could change and improve the world. He loved classical music, philosophy, literature and good wine – to him, all this was inseparable from the scientific concepts, from dreaming and imagining. He explained Theory of Relativity of Einstein to me, when I was 8, and he taught me how to play chess and think logically.

1934—Soviet-Union.-My-grandparents

My mother was just a baby when the WW II erupted. Half of my family died during the siege of Leningrad, starved and bombed by German Nazis. She actually almost died from starvation. My grandma fought Germans, was decorated for bravery: she helped to defend and then to rebuild her beloved city. Her husband, my grandfather, was a Communist, a Soviet cabinet minister, and an ethnic Chinese from Kazakhstan. He held ministerial posts for medical care and for food supply. He was denounced as a Japanese spy before the war (during the time when German spy network managed to infiltrate Soviet intelligence communication network and literally fed fake information to the Soviet leadership, significantly weakening it before that war). My grandfather was executed. Then, ‘rehabilitated’ posthumously, when the truth surfaced, finally. He was the love of my grandma’s life; she never remarried again.

Why am I telling you this, Binu? Because my formative years began when I was 3. My family was pulling me apart. My grandmother and my mother educated me as a Soviet boy, on great Russian literature, music, poetry. Every year I was sent for 2-3 months to Leningrad, to my grandma, and she would spoil me silly, dragging me to the opera houses, to concerts, museums. I loved and missed Russia enormously, while living most of the year in emotionally cold and pragmatic Czechoslovakia.

Both women – mother and grandmother: never tried to spare me of all those horrors they survived during the war. I lived through their stories they had to go through during the Siege of the city. My mother would often read me Russian poetry, and she cried. She missed her country and her city, tremendously. She was terrified by the war, even so many years after it ended. I was missing Leningrad, too. I still do.

In 1971 with my Russian grandma who was visiting in Pilsen

Then the 1968 came, and I was barely 5. Since then, there was no childhood. Since the first grade of elementary school, my life was one huge battle for survival. Between each class, several boys would come and unceremoniously beat me up, just for having Russian mother. First, I suffered in silence. Then I began fighting back. You know how racist Europeans are. I was constantly attacked not only because my mother was “Russian”; it was mainly because she had Asian features. I still remember that talk: “Look at your disgusting Asian ears, you shit”. When I played badminton in a gym, kids were pissing into my shoes during winter, and urine would turn to ice.

My parents divorced. Their marriage collapsed. But also, their political ideas were different. My father left Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. I was getting two totally different interpretations of the political events, since I was 5. From several highly intellectual and bright individuals in my family. I had to decide what was right and wrong.

They destroyed my childhood, but made a tough writer out of me, at a very early age.

I have never forgiven them. In the same time, I am very grateful to them. But above all, to my grandmother, who departed some 20 years ago. I miss her, and I admire her, more and more.

BM: You became a U.S citizen as a teenager. Can you tell us about the
politics behind it?

AV: To be precise, I became a US citizen when I was in my 20’s. But I left Czechoslovakia, with the Soviet passport, when I was very young.

Look, this is a very long story, and I often tell it, in abbreviated forms, but let me try, here, to explain in more detail:

In my late teens, I finally ‘cracked’. It was somehow ‘too much’: my family background, my messed-up childhood, and all that filth and lack of sincerity all around me. Czechs were determined to hate Russians/Soviets, but in the same time, they were shamelessly collaborating with the system. They always were: with the Austro-Hungarian Empire, with the Nazis, and now, with the West. They have been bitching throughout their modern history, but they were serving everyone who was in power. And they were always living extremely well. Under “Communism” they had their comfortable flats, summer houses, cars.

When I grew up, nothing was ‘sacred’. People were poking very vulgar jokes about everything, no woman was ‘out of reach’, drinking orgies were excessive. I guess, as a young writer, I was longing for at least some purity.

I hit the bottle, too. I smoked two packs a day. Being in an elite secondary school, my ‘being different’ was suddenly an asset. I could have almost any girl I desired. But it was all going, somehow, in a wrong direction.

I began listening to the Western propaganda outlets. In Pilsen, they were everywhere: on the radio short waves, on the television shows coming from West Germany, and from samizdat (‘forbidden’ literature, mainly Western propaganda, copied predominantly on the copying machines in the government offices, after hours). I began listening to the Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, BBC in English, Russian and Czech. I was thoroughly brainwashed into accepting official Western narrative regarding the “1968 events”. I was brainwashed into seeing the Soviet involvement in Afghanistan as a ‘crime’.

Divorce of my parents meant that I was, since early age, free to do basically what I desired. I travelled, on shoestrings, by train, all over Eastern Europe, from Balkans to Poland, alone. I think I began when I was 15.

I got myself a girlfriend in Poland, who was a member of student “Solidarity”. We took couple of trips to Gdansk, during protests. I began feeling like a big young dissident, writing erotic/revolutionary poetry, corresponding with the BBC. I did not care much about grades. When I needed money, I did some translations, as I spoke fluently in several languages.

Looking back, I was too young for all this; of course, I was.But again, as I said before, I had no childhood, and no sense of belonging; no patria. My life had no structure. I did not try to be different; I was different, mainly because of the circumstances. In those days, I thought I was a Communist, but a ‘reformist’ one. In fact, I was deeper and deeper influenced by the Western propaganda, and losing my marbles.

To fast-forward, I sent my first book of poetry to the West, and at somepoint,was ordered to leave the country. After all, I had Soviet citizenship, and Czechoslovak authorities saw me as an embarrassment – they had no idea what to do with me.

After dramatic hitchhiking through half of Europe, I spent some time in Italy, and then, very quickly, got political asylum and moved to New York.

I studied film. I worked simultaneously as an interpreter. My first wife was extremely talented concert pianist from Houston.

Right from the beginning, I realized that I had been indoctrinated, and that the reality of the West was totally different from what I heard from its propaganda media outlets.

I was surrounded by fellow students at Film School of Colombia University, when the first attack against Libya took place. I was promptly explained what was going on. While from the East Campus of Columbia University, I could see, at night, fires burning all over Harlem. It was before Harlem was turned into a middle-class neighborhood – before the poor people were forced to move out. It was real Harlem. I used to go there all the time, to an old jazz club called Baby Grand, to drink with the local people, learning about their life.

BM: What prompted you to come out of the devil’s den, the USA and take the
side of the people? Why did you choose the hard path?

AV: During those years I saw real America. I travelled a lot, but above all, I was allowed to see what this ‘marvelous’ capitalism was all about. My first wife was from very rich family. They were in oil business. Had I chosen to, I could have had anything I could ask for. I never did. But I saw clearly, how that world functioned. You know, few years earlier, their neighbors had Lady D as an au pair. Stuff like that…

I was not ready to make films, yet. I wrote my first novel, in Czech, and began ‘making money’ as an interpreter too. And that is when I ‘saw it all’. You know, these were years when Soviet Union was falling apart, and the West basically tried to loot everything. I was present at negotiations, when entire telephone exchanges of major Soviet cities were being ‘privatized’, or when the proud Soviet scientific vessels were sold for a scrap to multi-national food companies, so they could help fishing for deep water lobsters somewhere off the shore of Chile and Peru. I interpreted, and therefore I was present at close-door meetings. I never imagined that such cynicism, and such moral degeneracy could exist. It was capitalism at its naked self. Former Soviet republics, but also the former Czechoslovakia, were being stripped naked. And I saw what no one was supposed to see.

They paid well for the ‘high-level interpreting’. In those days, the going rate was between 500 and 1,000 dollars per day, plus expenses. But even ‘just’ interpreting, I felt filthy, disgusted with myself and with the world.

I felt depressed, suicidal. I saw no meaning in continuing this kind of existence. I wanted to run. I needed to run.

At the end, I did run. I separated from my wife. I dropped everything. And I left, with almost nothing (there is no way to save anything in New York, no matter what is your income), to Peru.

And Peru, in those days, during the so-called ‘Dirty War’, was described by many as ‘the saddest place on Earth’. It was truly destroyed, hopeless, dangerous and extremely tough place.

I burned all bridges behind me. I needed new start.

I always claimed that despite everything, I was a Communist. This was the time to prove it. This was the time to prove that I still had spine and balls and some heart where it was supposed to be – on the left.

BM: How did you cope with after rejecting USA and its politics? How did
you survive? It must be a struggle!

AV: First it was tough; very tough. But I always believed that I can write, and make films, and that I can do it well.

But you see, my decisions were made on ‘moral grounds’. I did not reject Western system and its imperialism, because ‘I could not make it there’. On the contrary: I ‘made it there’, I made it there ‘too much; too big’. I had all that most of immigrants are only dreaming about, and much, much more. But precisely, what others have been desiring, made me sick, and disgusted with the life itself.

It was not just rejecting USA; I was rejecting entire West, mainly Europe. I see and always saw Europe as the root of all problems (and horrors), which the world is facing. USA is just an offspring of Europe. A vulgar, muscular version of it. But true evil essence behind this global Western colonialist project, comes from Europe. Even the most terrible crimes committed on the US territory were committed by the first and second generation of Europeans: holocaust against the indigenous people, and the introduction of slavery.

You can clearly see the pattern even today: almost entire anti-Russian propaganda is defined and produced in the UK. The same goes for the entire neo-colonialist narrative.

But back to your question and to my hardship while fighting against the Western imperialism:I never saw my choice as some sacrifice. It is great privilege, an honor, to fight colonialist West. I confront it, particularly its brainwashing narrative, on all continents, and in all corners of the world. It is great fight and I love fighting it.

I often feel betrayed, even abandoned, by some of my comrades (although never by people like you, Binu), I sometimes fall from exhaustion, or injury. But I never regret embarking on this path. It is my obligation to fight for better, socialist world. I never see it as a sacrifice.

BM: What was your first anti-imperialist project after coming out of the
’empire’?

AV: As I mentioned earlier: Peru. But Peru was not just Peru. I worked in the ‘neighborhood’, too, intensively: in Bolivia, Ecuador and post-Pinochet Chile. I quickly understood and began describing, what was done to native people of Latin America. I saw and understood that wealth of the West is based on plunder of others. I understood how tremendous are ‘pre-Colombian’ cultures of the Americas.

BM: You worked long years in Latin America. Can you tell us about the
work you did?

AV: I did quite a lot there, basically in all Spanish speaking countries, plus Brazil and Caribbean. Among other issues, I covered wars in Peru and Colombia, but especially great revolutionary struggles in Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador. I always go to Cuba, periodically, as it is my intellectual and emotional home. I wrote a lot about Brazil under Lula and Dilma, crisscrossing entire huge country. I covered “Archives of Horror” left by Strossner’s dictatorship in Paraguay. I worked with great Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano, author of “Open Veins of Latin America”, and in Chile, exposing German Nazi colony “Colonia Dignidad”. I wrote about horrific gangs in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, and I wrote about aftermath of the US attack against Panama, particularly in the city of Colon. And I spend long time in Mexico… My last visit was in September, 2018, after AMLO won elections and Mexicans had chosen their first left-wing government in decades. For three weeks I filmed all over the country, from Tijuana to Merida, Yucatan.

BM: You also worked hard in Africa. Can you tell us about the work you did?

AV: That is the most scarred continent on Earth.

Entire world suffered from the Western imperialism and plunder, but Africa is ‘unique’, because nowhere else in a modern history, brutality of Westerners reached such climax. Well, with the exception of Southeast Asia, perhaps.

I was filming for a Latin America television channel Telesur in the toughest slums in Kenya and Uganda. I produced documentary film about monstrous Dadaab camp, constructed for mainly Somali refugees in the middle of a dessert. And I produced and directed my big, 90-minutes documentary “Rwanda Gambit”, about how the West created absolutely false narrative about Rwanda genocide, and how it keeps silent about one of the most monstrous genocides of all times – that in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where Rwanda and Uganda, on behalf of the West, have been totally stripping off this mineral rich nation. The DRC has everything – from coltan to uranium, from gold to diamonds. Some 9 million Congolese people already died, since the invasion of Rwanda.

BM: I think you have a love affair with Asia. Living long years in Asia and working for Asia, especially on Indonesia. How did this come about?

AV: Asia is my home. I am Asian culturally, and some of my blood is from here.

I love China, but I also feel very comfortable in Japan and in other countries.

Indonesia is definitely not one of them. I do not live there, I never could; I’d rather die. I am so horrified by it, that I write about it often, and make films. I do it as a warning to the world. I am in Indonesia for totally opposite reasons than ‘love’: after 1965, this 4th most populous country on earth, was turned into one huge laboratory, by the West. Indonesia is not a country, it is a ‘concept’.

Before 1965, under left-wing, anti-imperialist President Sukarno, Indonesia was a progressive country, a cradle of Non-Aligned Movement. All the natural resources were nationalized.

The West overthrew Sukarno in the bloodiest coup of the 20th century. Between 1-3 million people were butchered, and rivers were clogged with corpses: members of the Communist Party (PKI), intellectuals, teachers, unionists.

I call it ‘intellectual Hiroshima’. The West suggested that all theatres and film studios get shut down, that Chinese and Russian languages are banned, together with the Communist ideology. Almost all writers and painters were imprisoned in Buru concentration camp.

Mass rapes took place all over the archipelago.

Thinking people were either murdered or forever silenced. Instead, cheap pop, Hollywood films and junk food were injected and promoted. In many ways, Indonesian culture ceased to exist, and its diversity was killed.

Indonesia committed, with great help from the West, three genocides in just over half of century: genocide of 1965, then in East Timor, and now an on-going genocide in West Papua.

Nation became extremely religious, oppressive and dogmatic. In the same time, this nation of well over 300 million (official statistics lie, putting the number of people at somewhere around 250 million) counts with no great writers, filmmakers, thinkers or scientists.

Everybody there thinks the same – the way ‘they suppose to think’: they love capitalism, hate Communists, they see destruction of their own natural resources as ‘progress’, they all listen to the same outdated Western pop music, watching the lowest Hollywood productions as well as tacky local horror films, and have the lowest number of books read per capita.

I try to explain, to analyze what happened there. I am simultaneously filming two big documentaries: one on the total destruction of the nature in the third biggest islands on earth – Borneo (known in Indonesia as Kalimantan) – and about the collapse of Jakarta, which is now the most polluted and perhaps one of the most ‘unlivable’ major cities on earth. Of course, I do it without any funding, as in the West and in Southeast Asia, Indonesia is ‘untouchable’. It does precisely what the West wants it to do: it sacrifices hundreds of millions of its people, as well as its nature, so the Western population can prosper. Therefore, it is almost never criticized.

So that’s about Indonesia.

I love Asia, overall, and it is my home; particularly north Asia. China, Japan, Korea(s) and Russian ‘Far East’.

Southeast Asia is totally different story. It is mightily ‘dark story’ which I keep documenting. It suffered monstrously in the past 60 years: Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, East Timor, West Papua, Indonesia, even Thailand. It has been suffering precisely because of the Western imperialism. But people were conditioned not to see, not to understand what was done to them. Therefore, I work there, writing books and making films. Somebody has to…

BM: You are also a war correspondent. You must have had many memorable
events as a war correspondent. Anything particular you would like to
share with us?

AV: Yes. But war is everywhere, not just in those few places where it is officially recognized.

Of course, I work in Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq.

But I also work in Kashmir, or in the toughest slums in Africa, in gang lands of Central America, or in Gaza. These are war zones, too. War is where justice, including social justice, collapsed; was destroyed.

I fully agree with what Hemingway once wrote: “There are two types of writers: those who went to war, and those who are envious of them.”

Since war exists almost everywhere, a writer who is not touching it, is a liar.

War is reality. It is terrible, but when it is fought for justice and freedom, it is much better than some fake peace which is created by the Western colonialists. In this type of ‘peace’, all health and life-expectancy indicators of a war zone are present. Rape, injuries… all like in a war zone.

The Western propagandists created very dangerous ‘cult of peace’. To the West, peace is when the country fully sacrifices its natural resources and its people, for the profits of Western corporations and citizens, but the population is submissive, resigned.

They often and very correctly say in Latin America: no justice, no peace!

BM: You worked with Noam Chomsky on a book and a documentary. Can you
tell something about this legendary man? Some secret about Chomsky the
person?

AV: Noam loves roses. And a good wine. And he is, in essence, a very kind man, with great sense of humor.

It is pity that we lately disagree: on Russia, Syria and China, for instance.

But I respect most of his work, and I have to say that he did a lot, really a lot, for our humanity and for this planet.

BM: Noam Chomsky said about your book Oceania, it evoked “the reality
of the contemporary world. He has also not failed to trace the painful –
and particularly for the West, shameful realities to their historical
roots”. Any comments?

AV: Noam kindly endorsed several of my book, and even wrote Prefaces.

When it comes to Noam’s own writing related to what you call ‘shameful realities to their historical roots’, he is particularly powerful when describing the conquest of the “New World”, especially what is now called Latin America, but also the United States and Canada. I believe that his writing on these subject opened eyes of millions of people in all parts of the world.

BM: You write a lot of books on history, cotemporary politics,philosophy, fiction etc. Which is your most well received book?

AV: Critically most acclaimed book is my revolutionary novel Point of No Return. It even got super positive reviews from the most feared critics of Le Monde, Le Figaro and Paris Match.

But also, great success has been my 840-page Exposing Lies of the Empire – a book which compiles my investigative work from all continents, where imperialism is robbing, destroying and manipulating people. It is written in totally new, experimental but very well received by readers style: between novel and political fiction, between philosophy and journalism.

Of course, my book with Noam Chomsky On Western Terrorism, has been doing very well, and translated to some 35 languages (I actually lost count).

BM: You are also a documentary film maker. How do you switch from being
an author and as a film maker so easily?

AV: I actually don’t. It is all one huge struggle against Western imperialism, and for the bright days of the global Communism, no?

My work is like one tremendous mosaic, and as one big battle. I use different weapons, as I use various ways to express myself. It can be through novels, investigative journalism, philosophy, through non-fiction books, films, photographs, but also interviews that I constantly give, or through speaking in public, or at the major universities.

BM: You have traveled in 160 countries around the world. Which country
will you prefer to reside post retirement? I of course know that you are the
kind of fighter who won’t even think of retirement.

AV: You are correct: I will never retire – that would be my end.

My story is my life; and my journey is my story.

Revolution is called ‘the process’, in many countries of Latin America. It is one continuous journey: it can never end. If one is tired of this journey, he or she is tired of this world, and of life itself.

About where to live, if I could choose? You would be surprised, as it would have nothing to do with my revolutionary struggle:

Well, not necessarily, because one of the countries would be my beloved Cuba.

Another is Japan. But I do live there, for many, many years. Or more precisely, it is one of the countries where I have been living, one of my ‘bases’ until now. Of course, Japan has absolutely appalling foreign policy, but I admire its culture, its nature, poetry, literature, cinema, food. I travel to all of its corners, I feel safe, and I write well when there.

In Chile

And Chile. I have lived there, on different occasions, some 4 years in total. And again – Chile has stunning nature, deep culture, tremendous poetry, literature, excellent food and wine.

BM: As you have traveled all around the world, which country do you
think is doing the best for its citizens?

AV: There are actually two questions hiding inside your question:

First: Which country is doing the best for its citizens, at the expense of plundered and colonized countries? Answer to this would be: definitely almost entire Europe

Second: Which country is doing the best for its citizens without plundering the world? The answer is: Bolivia, Cuba, China, Russia, Iran, North Korea (to the extend possible), Venezuela (to the extend possible under the terror implanted from abroad.)

BM: What is your insight to break the strangle hold of imperialism?

AV: One cannot negotiate with fascism and imperialism.

Oppressed, plundered countries, have to unite and fight.

The first round of struggle was already won, in the past. For instance, heroic Vietnamese nation defeated both the French colonialists, and the US imperialists, militarily.

But then, the Western imperialists regrouped. Emboldened first by successfully dividing China and Soviet Union, and then by ruing Soviet Union under that nitwit Gorbachev and criminal alcoholic Yeltsin, they grabbed again what they lost, shouting “Peace, Peace!”, meaning “do not dare to fight us, just accept and submit!”

Imperialists can be defeated. It was clearly demonstrated in Syria, and now both China and Russia are standing firm, confronting Western threats, provocations, sanctions and intimidation.

One should never show the weakness, when faced by Western terror.

Look at the planet; look what happened to the countries that surrendered, knelt: look at that horror in Indonesia, in East Africa, in the Middle East, Southeast Asia. Look at India after it began to worship market fundamentalism. Is this the world that we want? If not, all anti-imperialist forces should unite and fight.

And we should never expect that the Western public joins us. Western public is spoiled by privileges, and it does not have any left wing, anymore, only self-promoting, weeping discussion clubs. Countries truly fighting against Western imperialism have almost no allies in the West.

In India with Arundhati Roy

BM: What is your insight about the rise of autocratic leaders like Trump n USA, Modi in India, Bolsonaro in Brazil? Do you think there is a pattern? Some underlying current?

AV: Yes. In confused nations, where Western masters, right-wing mass media and education systems successfully manufactured obedient and self-centered, spineless band of so-called ‘elites’, what can be expected? They smeared the left, put left-wing parties and movements under the microscope, and brainwasher or at least confused the voters

Believe it or not, great majority of people even in the countries that were governed by left-wing governments, like Brazil or Ecuador, had almost no access to left-wing media. Horrible propaganda outlets like CNN in Spanish or FOX in Spanish, are ‘informing’ the citizens. In Brazil, the situation was very similar, or worse.

For years, I was warning about this. The left has to ‘invest’ into its media, education, even counter-propaganda outlets.

I talked with Chomsky a lot about this. He actually understands very well what is going on. In our book, I told my story, about how brainwashed I was, as a child, by pro-Western, pro-imperialist radio and television stations. And of course, not only me: everyone is in danger, in Syria and Iran, in China and Russia, all over Latin America.

Therefore, we have to unite, we have to double our efforts and do all we can to tell our side of the story.

And we have to intertwine our efforts. Like this interview: I love it. My Indian brother and I, a Soviet internationalist educated on Cuban thoughts, exchanging ideas! Publicly and frankly.

BM: Climate Change and Resource Crisis are driving the world towards collapse. Do you think that the world can still be saved? What’re your suggestions?

AV: It can be saved, but again, only if imperialism and neo-colonialism are destroyed.

The best example is Indonesia and the film that I am making, about destruction of Borneo Island. In the West, people in order to feel good, turn off every light when they leave the room, they turn off water. But their companies are plundering what is left of the native tropical forest, they are flattening entire mountains.

Because of Western over-production and over-consumption, entire island-nations in Oceania are becoming uninhabitable.

What is needed is to re-think entire ‘world order’. Do we really need economic growth? Or should it all be about re-distribution.

Comes China! Despite what people are told to believe, (again, by the Western propaganda outlets), China is at the forefront of struggle for so-called “Ecological Civilization”. I know a lot about it, because I am working with a great philosopher John Cobb Jr., who has enormous influence on the Chinese leadership, including their landmark decision to engrave ecological civilization into the constitution. We are currently writing a book on the subject, together. China is intentionally slowing down its economic growth, it is returning back to its traditional wisdom, and it has also managed to reverse migration from the countryside to the cities, by greatly improving the rural life. The book will be available in less than one month.

Lemur fell on me in Madagaskar

BM: Are you happy?

AV: Yes. Insanely. Even when I am fxxxxd and hardly able to move.

I am a fighter. I am an internationalist, a Communist. We are winning. Slowly, very slowly, but winning.

The journey is tough, it is dangerous. But I don’t want any other journey, or any other fate.

My life is not perfect, but I would never trade. I do my best. And I love it the way it is.

And I love stories. Without good stories, there is no life. Along the journey, the road, there are millions of stories. They define and illustrate our human kind. Based on these stories, there is great revolutionary struggle, igniting our planet once again.

Imperialists want us to forget about the stories. They want us to live on pre-fabricated junk stories of Hollywood and Disney. It is our duty to tell the real stories, because they are much more beautiful than computer-generated ones, and they are true.

That’s why I create, write, and film. No stories, no revolution!

And more I hear and see and create, the happier I get.

*

Andre Vltchek is a philosopher, novelist, filmmaker and investigative journalist. He has covered wars and conflicts in dozens of countries. Three of his latest books are Revolutionary Optimism, Western Nihilism, a revolutionary novel “Aurora” and a bestselling work of political non-fiction: “Exposing Lies Of The Empire”. View his other books here. Watch Rwanda Gambit, his groundbreaking documentary about Rwanda and DRCongo and his film/dialogue with Noam Chomsky “On Western Terrorism”. Vltchek presently resides in East Asia and the Middle East, and continues to work around the world. He can be reached through his website and his Twitter.

Bernard Arnault, the master of Louis Vuitton: with a fortune of about US$80bn this plutocrat is now France’s richest man

As President Emmanuel Macron slashes wages and conditions in workplaces across France, the country’s 13 wealthiest people have become $27.6 billion richer since the start of 2018. This has made France the country in the world where billionaires are increasing their wealth the fastest, according to a report published by Bloomberg last week.

Since January alone, the wealth of French billionaires has increased by a whopping 12.2 percent. This compares to 7.1 percent growth for Japanese billionaires, 6.3 percent for Chinese billionaires and 1.2 percent for American billionaires.

The class divide revealed by the figures in the Bloomberg report could not be more stark. On the one hand, Macron arrogantly denounces workers opposed to his policies as “lazy” because they earn €9.88 per hour (€7.83 after tax) and criticize his cuts to social spending and income taxes for the rich. On the other hand, he is overseeing the transfer of more than $900,000 every hour into the pockets of this tiny group of financial parasites, corporate raiders and fashion heiresses.

The two richest individuals in France, Bernard Arnault and François Pinault, have raked in an additional $22.3 billion during this calendar year. Arnault, the chairman of luxury products conglomerate LVMH Moët Louis Vuitton SE, is the richest person in Europe and the fourth richest person in the world, with an estimated fortune of $76.4 billion.

Pinault, who has a fortune of $35.5 billion, is the founder of luxury conglomerate Kering, the owner of brands such as Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent, and of the financial holding company Artemis.

As Macron eliminates the Tax on Large Fortunes (ISF) and slashes corporate tax, the surge in the stock market values for LVMH and Kering is going directly into Arnault’s and Pinault’s pockets. Bloomberg wrote, “Renewed demand for luxury goods from China and a growing presence in e-commerce have lifted sales and propelled both holding groups into the ranks of France’s most valuable companies. A surge in art sales at Pinault’s auction house Christie’s has also contributed.”

Since January alone, the wealth of French billionaires has increased by a whopping 12.2 percent. This compares to 7.1 percent growth for Japanese billionaires, 6.3 percent for Chinese billionaires and 1.2 percent for American billionaires.

Similarly, l’Oréal heiress Françoise Bettencourt-Meyers added $3.7 billion to her net worth, and the brothers Alain and Gerard Wertheimer, the owners of Chanel, added $2.4 billion to their fortunes.

These figures make clear that the policies of the Macron administration are based on lies. Masses of people are being told they must accept cuts to wages and salaries, the evisceration of unemployment benefits, a broad expansion of temporary work, planned cuts to health care and pensions, and the end of lifetime employment in the public sector because there is no money. But this is a political fraud.

In fact, there is plenty of money. The problem—in France as around the rest of the world—is that it is being diverted into the bank accounts of a parasitic and money-mad ruling elite.

In the run-up to the 2012 French presidential elections, economist Thomas Piketty published a report on wealth inequality in France based on 2010 statistics. It showed that the top 10 percent of French society held 62 percent of the wealth, and the top 1 percent held 24 percent of the wealth. The bottom half of French society, in contrast, held only 4 percent of the wealth. After eight years of economic crisis and social austerity, the class divide is doubtless even more blatant today.

The social inequality revealed in such reports is a condemnation of the capitalist system. Last year, the world was shocked by news that just eight billionaires owned as much wealth as the bottom half of humanity. The Bloomberg report underscores that French capitalism—despite its pretensions to be a kinder, gentler and more regulated social order—is riven by the same insoluble social contradictions as world capitalism as a whole.

There is little in terms of social physiognomy and outlook to distinguish the billionaires who dominate French society and economic life from their US or British counterparts.

Arnault, whose family ran a local construction firm, used his political connections and availability of state subsidies to restructure and downsize the textile industry, vastly increase his fortune, and ultimately acquire LVMH in the 1980s. He left in his wake a trail of shuttered factories and devastated communities across northern France, which is now an electoral base of the neo-fascist National Front. He has become fabulously wealthy by strategically acquiring ever more fashion and luxury brands to add to his conglomerate. He endorsed Macron last year.

Similarly, Pinault came to prominence in the 1980s as a financier and corporate raider, making vast sums by restructuring and downsizing bankrupt wood and paper companies while pocketing state subsidies designed to help distressed firms. Like Arnault, he used this initial fortune to acquire an empire of luxury, finance and retail firms through which he became one of France’s wealthiest billionaires.

As for Bettencourt-Meyers, she inherited her wealth last year from her mother, the late Liliane Bettencourt. Bettencourt’s holding company owned a massive stake in L’Oréal, the cosmetics firm of Bettencourt-Meyers’ grandfather Eugène Schueller, a leading Nazi-collaborationist and financer of French fascist groups in World War II.

A financial aristocracy has emerged in France that is no less entrenched, arrogant and sclerotic than the feudal aristocracy overthrown by the French revolution two centuries ago. As Macron seeks to remove all barriers to their enrichment by liquidating the social rights won by the working class in France over decades of struggle in the 20th century, the only appropriate response of the working class is to fight for the expropriation of their ill-gotten wealth.

Time magazine announced Tuesday that it was giving its “Person of the Year” award to journalists facing violence and repression for their efforts to expose the truth. The four individuals and one organization selected by Time are certainly deserving of public sympathy.

Wa Lone, 32 years old, and Kyaw Soe Oo, 28, were jailed a year ago in Myanmar (Burma) by the military junta for reporting for Reuters on mass executions of the Rohingya minority in that country.

Maria Ressa was recently jailed on trumped-up tax charges by the government of Philippines President Duterte because she reported on her website, Rappler, on the murders of thousands of poor residents of working class slums, labeled “drug dealers” by Duterte.

The Capital Gazette, the local daily newspaper in Annapolis, Maryland, was honored after five of its staff were murdered in a mass slaying in June. The gunman was a local resident who sought revenge because the newspaper reported on his prosecution for sexual harassment several years ago.

Jamal Khashoggi, a member of the Saudi aristocracy, went into exile and became a columnist for the Washington Post after he had a falling out with the monarchical regime now headed by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. In one of the most notorious crimes of the year, a Saudi execution squad grabbed Khashoggi when he visited the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, on October 2, killing him and dismembering his body.

As this brief description suggests, those hailed by Time under the headline “The Guardians” are actually quite disparate, including journalists reporting under authoritarian regimes in Burma and the Philippines, a US newspaper targeted by a lone madman, and Khashoggi, who was not so much a journalist as the representative of a dissident wing of the corrupt and highly privileged Saudi ruling elite. He was a grandson of the personal doctor to King Abdul Aziz al-Saud, founder of the dynasty, and nephew of billionaire arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, a key figure in the Iran-Contra scandal of the 1980s.

Most of the nominees—as well as others mentioned in the Time cover story, journalists from Bangladesh, Brazil, Sudan and Hong Kong—have in common the fact that they have posed little or no threat to the interests of American imperialism or its allies and client states. With the exception of Khashoggi and Saudi Arabia, the regimes with which they came into conflict were either at odds with the United States or not close allies.

The Time list includes no journalists or whistleblowers from Israel, Egypt, India or any of the NATO countries. And there are no journalists who exposed state secrets or government misconduct in the United States.

As for Khashoggi, he was aligned with a faction of the US ruling class that views the Saudi monarchy, at least under the leadership of the crown prince, as a disaster waiting to happen, and which has sought a change of policy on such issues as the war in Yemen and the Saudi promotion of Islamic extremist groups throughout the Muslim world. The naming of Khashoggi must be considered a shot across the bow of Donald Trump, who has come under attack from sections of the US media for defending the Saudi regime in its murder of the one-time regime insider-turned Washington Post commentator and critic.

It is most of all notable that the Time cover story on courageous journalists risking violence and repression to uncover the truth makes no mention of the most famous persecuted journalist on the planet, Julian Assange. The former editor of WikiLeaks has been effectively jailed in the Ecuadorian embassy in London for the past six years, seeking to avoid extradition to the United States.

It was revealed last month that a federal grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia—the judicial district that handles cases involving the CIA and Pentagon—has returned a secret indictment of Assange, likely related to his role in WikiLeaks’ publication of US military and diplomatic secrets, mainly relating to war crimes by US personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as State Department efforts to destabilize and browbeat governments around the world.

The editors of Time magazine are well aware of Assange’s courageous role carrying out the basic work of genuine journalism—uncovering the truths that powerful interests want to conceal. In 2010, the year that WikiLeaks became a household word for its publication of US military reports leaked by Chelsea Manning on atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan, Assange was the runner-up for Time’s “Person of the Year” to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. WikiLeaks was described admiringly as a “revolutionary force, wresting secrets into the public domain on a scale without precedent.”

In 2016, when WikiLeaks published leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta, exposing the DNC’s effort to rig the Democratic presidential primary campaign against Bernie Sanders and Clinton’s groveling addresses to audiences of Wall Street bankers, Time’s own readers chose Assange as “Person of the Year” in an online poll. The magazine chose president-elect Donald Trump instead.

The “Person of the Year” award is similar to the Nobel Peace Prize in that it is invariably handed out on the basis of the reactionary political calculations of a section of big business. The Nobel prize is awarded by a committee of the Norwegian parliament, so it can occasionally reflect the interests of the European imperialist powers and deliver a poke in the eye to the United States. Usually though, the peace prize goes to an imperialist warmonger, like US President Barack Obama, or a prominent dissident in a country targeted by imperialism, like Liu Xiaobo in China.

Time ’s “Person of the Year,” of course, goes to a nominee chosen by the magazine, and therefore someone selected from the standpoint of service to the interests of the American capitalist class. The magazine was long owned by the Luce family, and later was the flagship of the giant Time Warner media conglomerate. It was sold last year to Meredith, publisher of glossy upscale magazines like Better Homes & Gardens. Then, in September 2018, Meredith sold Time to Marc Benioff, the billionaire owner of Salesforce.com, who will run the magazine as a stand-alone piece of personal property, like Jeff Bezos of Amazon, who owns the Washington Post.

The pro-imperialist perspective was elaborated by editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal in an essay explaining the magazine’s choice of “Person of the Year,” in which he declared, “For all the insults hurled by the president at the press, rhetoric which has been deployed by dangerous actors around the world, the US remains a beacon for truth and free expression. This is a nation where, as we saw this year, a news organization can sue the White House and win, even at the hands of a judge appointed by that very White House.”

The editor-in-chief is silent on the fact that the Obama administration brought more leak prosecutions—usually invoking the Espionage Act—than all previous US governments. He says nothing of the jailing of Chelsea Manning, the calls by US officials for the assassination of Edward Snowden, or the declaration by then-CIA director, now US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, that WikiLeaks is a “hostile non-state intelligence service.”

Even more remarkably, the Time cover story elaborating on “The Guardians,” while it begins with a paean to journalists who challenge authority, becomes a lengthy argument in favor of censorship of the internet, citing the alleged flood of Russian propaganda during the 2016 US presidential election campaign.

The cover story argues that Facebook is in line for “an overdue reckoning on how to control the driverless car of social media,” and criticizes Google because its YouTube subsidiary has posted videos produced by the Moscow-based RT network. The article concludes, “Information on social media turns out to be hugely problematic.”

Indeed it does—from the standpoint of the ruling class. Not only is information disseminated without adequate “control” by the corporate-controlled media (here the headline “The Guardians” takes on a sinister connotation), but the internet has become the vehicle for the self-organization of working people independently of the other “guardians” of capitalism, the trade union bureaucracies and “left” parties of the bourgeoisie, as shown in the US teachers’ strikes and the “yellow vest” protests in France.

Patrick Martin is a senior editor with wsws.org, a Marxian organization.

Oil twilight. Credit: armbrusterbix/Unsplash

The following interview is the first in a new series that will address salient issues in the impacts and politics of climate change.

Avoiding the catastrophic effects of climate change requires a rapid move away from fossil fuels and lower emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. On behalf of The Wire, Nagraj Adve interviewed Simon Pirani, senior visiting research fellow, Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, to understand different aspects of this energy transition. He is also the author of Burning Up: A Global History of Fossil Fuel Consumption (2018).

The questions are in bold. The interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

In your understanding, the use of coal, oil and gas, particularly since 1950, has structural roots in technological systems, and underlying those, social and economic systems. Can you elaborate on this and what it implies for greenhouse gas emissions?

A good example of a technological system is an urban transport system. Usually, these are centred on cars, which are fuel-intensive to build and even more to use. Priority is given to cars and the roads they use. Other modes of transport – public buses, rail, bicycles – and pedestrians take second place.

How have these technological systems evolved in such illogical, unpleasant and fuel-inefficient ways? The answer is to be found in social and economic systems. Car-based cities were first built in the US in the early 20th century. Politically powerful car manufacturers lobbied against rail and public transit systems, and resisted regulators’ attempts to compel them to make cars more fuel-efficient.

By the late 20th century, the US not only had more cars per person than any other country, but thanks to its economic dominance, had helped spread this system to other rich countries, and was starting to spread it to developing nations as well.

There’s another way. Cities such as Amsterdam have been designed to put cars in second place. Why shouldn’t all cities be like that?

To cut fossil fuel consumption, we need to look beyond the individual consumer at the end of the technological systems, and think more about the systems through which they consume. Transport is just one such technological system. Other significant ones are electricity production, heating and lighting for buildings, industries and industrial agriculture. In each case, engineers identified huge inefficiencies long ago in the way they use fuels. Why are these inefficiencies not addressed? For reasons to do with the way society works.

Of course, there are plenty of rich world consumers who could slash their personal consumption tomorrow with no great hardship. But the first focus of our attention must be the technological, social and economic systems through which most fuels are consumed. I can’t envisage a transition away from fossil fuels without changing all these systems.

You argue that the ongoing transition away from fossil fuels worldwide has only taken its “first steps”. What would a more comprehensive transition imply?

Most new investment going into electricity generation, worldwide, is for renewables. This is hugely important and hopeful. But for electricity generation – let alone the other technological systems that use fossil fuels – to really move away from fossil fuels for good, much more has to be done.

For a start, integrated technologies made possible by the computer revolution of the last 30 years can be used to reduce electricity demand. They can also be used to integrate electricity supply systems with systems to supply heat and other forms of energy. We now have computer systems that can balance electricity supplies – i.e., make sure the electricity is where it is needed, when it is needed – and that can use multiple small-scale sources of supply, such as many wind turbines or solar panels. Storing electricity is still a headache for engineers, and dealing with intermittency (due to the fact that the wind doesn’t always blow and the Sun doesn’t always shine) is tricky. But they’re working on it.

Private corporations that now dominate the electricity sector in many countries obstruct this type of change. For them, electricity is a marketable commodity. They make money by selling as much of it as possible. But what is needed is electricity as a service. Changing electricity systems is therefore not just a technological problem but a social and economic problem, of breaking the power of big energy corporations.

And electricity generation is only one use of fossil fuels. In other areas of the economy, even less effort has been made to move away from fossil fuels.

False hopes are raised. Electric cars is a good example. While an electric car engine is more energy-efficient than an internal combustion engine, there is no evidence that it is more carbon-efficient if the electricity is produced from fossil fuels. Electric car enthusiasts always respond, “It will be okay if the electricity is produced from renewables”. But that is a huge ‘if’. We can reduce greenhouse gas emissions faster by transforming urban transport systems.

Governments are currently meeting in Katowice, Poland, for the 24th Conference of the Parties, a process you’ve called a “collective failure”. Why? And how would you respond to the argument that, under the Paris Agreement, governments can up their commitments every five years?

When the world’s governments signed the 1992 Rio convention, they recognised that fossil fuel use had to be cut. In the quarter of a century since, global annual fossil fuel use has risen by more than 60%. What is that if not a collective failure?

The talks were always focused on using market mechanisms to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, despite the catastrophic failure of the emission trading schemes. The other constant in the talks, as insisted by the US, was that there would be no binding targets that nations would’ve to meet.

The 2015 Paris Agreement on the one hand gave civil society some important levers to work with – particularly the reference to the importance of keeping global average temperatures to 1.5º C above pre-industrial levels. On the other hand, the agreement finally abandoned efforts to adopt binding targets. Moreover, the voluntary targets tabled are estimated to be associated with an average temperature rise of about 2.7º C even if they are met.

Obviously, it would be welcome if more nations adopt and improve on their voluntary targets. But we should not live in a world of false hopes. The talks have failed because they have effectively limited action to the adoption of market mechanisms. They have left the industrial and financial elites that control the world’s economies untouched. Thus, they’ve made, and continue to make, decisions that have ensured huge increases in fossil fuel use.

They have cloaked the endless failures of governments to regulate fossil fuel use more effectively in diplomatic discourse, and the continuing flow of hundreds of billions of dollars per year in subsidies to fossil fuel production and consumption.

Where do you then see the way forward? What are the social forces that can effect change or pressurise governments to act with greater urgency?

Some social forces are making their voices heard pretty loudly. Look at the thousands of Australian school students who went on strike last month, demanding government action on global warming. We will see much more of these sorts of protests in future.

Someone who is 18 years old today will realise that nine of the ten hottest years ever recorded were in their lifetime, and the tenth, 1998, was just a few years before they were born. Young people aren’t easily fooled.

We’re also seeing campaigns against unconventional fossil fuel extraction. Oil and gas companies have increasingly moved to them – e.g. fracking and oil recovery from Canadian tar sands – as the resource base has changed. Social movements make a difference. If a type of energy supply loses what companies call their “social licence to operate” – as nuclear energy has in many countries – it becomes unsustainable.

I don’t want to suggest that it’s easy to turn the broad concern that the vast majority of people feel about the threat of dangerous global warming into effective action. This isn’t about one government policy that can be altered by campaigning pressure. That is why we need to look at the technological, social and economic systems that consume fossil fuels, and think about how all these can be changed. These are big problems we have to face collectively.

China is the world’s largest emitter and key to current emissions. What does your analysis of China’s energy trends since the late 1990s tell you about how those might play out in the near future?

China’s decision in the 1990s to become the “workshop of the world” was essentially a decision to produce energy-intensive raw materials. These include steel, aluminium and cement in vast quantities, and export them – or products made with them – to rich countries. It led to a huge rise in China’s fossil-fuel use.

The corresponding fall in rich countries’ fuel use led many of them to claim that their economies were “decarbonising”. But in fact they had merely shifted their energy-intensive processes to China and other developing nations.

As for the future, China’s decision to invest heavily in renewables is welcome. But if it intends to take action on global warming, a bigger change in the way that its economy works will be needed.

What specific choices and/or mistakes has the West, and in particular the US, made that India ought not to repeat as we continue on our development trajectory?

As a historian and researcher of fossil fuels, I don’t feel qualified to make big statements about India’s developmental trajectory. It’s for the Indian people to decide. About the systems that consume fossil fuels in India, I have learned a great deal from Sunila Kale, whose work shows that different states have been electrified differently, according to the social forces at work.

For example, the strong farmers’ lobby in Maharashtra led to (limited) electrification in the countryside to meet their irrigation needs for growing cash crops. In Odisha, private companies have been brought in but have limited their activities to cities, where they can make money by selling electricity, and doing little to nothing to address rural electrification.

Society is divided by class, and this is reflected in its energy systems. The transition away from fossil fuels cannot be separate from progress towards social justice.

In This Changes Everything, Naomi Klein has said that climate change can be a catalyst for positive change in many ways: rebuilding local economies, reclaiming public services like health and water, etc. Your thoughts?

Klein makes the essential connection between systems of wealth and power and the technological systems that make up the fossil-fuel-powered economy. And I completely agree with her that the transition away from fossil fuels must be thought about together with fighting for public services, against privatisation and against the commodification of these services, and developing new, better kinds of energy systems, transport systems, urban environments, etc.

What would you say to young people who ask, “What can we do?”, but may find systemic change too challenging or abstract? What can give them hope?

Working to change systems is far more convincing than individual action. For example, if you can fit a solar water heater at home, great. But even better is to campaign for integrated energy systems that encourage solar and wind power generators to be installed city-wide. If you decide to ride a bicycle instead of driving a car, great. But even better is to find out why the city you live in is built in such a car-friendly, cycle-unfriendly way, and do something about that.

Don’t let the government tell you it is fixing the climate problem. None of the governments are. Society has to take this issue into its own hands, which means taking it away from government. That’s a necessary starting point. Make energy and climate issues a collective problem for all of us.

Nagraj Adve works and writes on issues related to global warming. His booklet, Global Warming in the Indian Context: An Introductory Overview, has been translated into Hindi, Kannada and Tamil.

Protesters
wearing yellow vests kneel on the street as they gather in front of the
Opera House as part of the “yellow vests” movement in Paris, France,
December 15, 2018. Credit: REUTERS/Christian Hartmann

Paris: Thousands of protesters took to the streets
of French cities on Saturday in the fifth weekend of nationwide
demonstrations against Emmanuel Macron’s government, despite calls to
hold off after a shooting in Strasbourg earlier this week.

In Paris, police were out in force to contain possible outbursts of
violence. But several major stores, such as the Galeries Lafayette, were
open to welcome Christmas shoppers.

On the Champs-Elysees, a handful of topless activists from the
feminist protest group Femen faced security forces a few meters away
from the Elysee Palace, the president’s residence.

The interior minister said around 69,000 police officers were active
on Saturday with a reinforced presence in the cities of Toulouse,
Bordeaux and Saint-Etienne.

On Friday, President Macron called for a return to calm in France after nearly a month of protests by the so-called ‘yellow vest’ movement against his government’s policies. The demonstrations have hit growth and caused widespread disruption.

“France needs calm, order and a return to normal,” Macron said, after a meeting of European Union leaders in Brussels.

The ‘yellow vest’
movement started in mid-November with protests at junctions and
roundabouts against fuel tax increases, but quickly became a wider
mobilisation against Macron’s economic policies.

Successive weekends of protests in Paris have led to vandalism and violent clashes with security forces.

In a televised address to the nation on Monday, Macron announced wage
rises for the poorest workers and tax cuts for pensioners in further
concessions meant to end the movement but many said they would maintain
pressure.

The government, as well as several unions and opposition politicians
also called on protesters to stay off the streets on Saturday, after
four people were killed in a gun attack at a Christmas market in the
historic city of Strasbourg.

Congregating in Delhi, thousands of farmers and tribals from 26 states of India, marched from Ramlila Maidan to Parliament Street to make their voices heard at the gates of India’s Parliament. Holding red, yellow and green flags, singing songs and shouting slogans, the historic farmers’ march pledged to intensify their struggle against the ‘kisan virodhi’ policies of the Narendra Modi government that had added to their distress, and oust it in the next general elections.

The farmers, united under the umbrella of the All Indian Kisan Coordination Committee, are demanding that Parliament must convene a 21-day special session to discuss the ongoing agrarian crisis.
If the Modi government can conduct a midnight session in the House to pass the GST (good and services tax) Bill then why are the farmer’s issues not on its agenda? the farmers asked. They are also demanding Parliament must pass the two Bills prepared by a Kisan Parliament last year to ensure liberation from debt and assured remunerative prices. Two Bills have been introduced as private member bills in Parliament by K.K. Raghesh, a CPI(M) MP and Joint Secretary of AIKS in Rajya Sabha, and by Raju Shetti, MP from Maharashtra in the Lok Sabha and leader of the Swabhiman Shetkari Sangathana.

Addressing the farmers, Raju Shetti said, “Aaj Kisaan yahan pe nange aaye hai, aur asliyat ye hai ki kisaanon ne iss sarkaar ko nanga kardiya hai. Ye hakikat leke hum yahan aaye hai, Narendra Modi ko chetawani dene.” He added, “Desh ki azaadi ke baad pehli baar kisan iss tarah ek manch pe aaye hai. Agle saal lal quile se bhashan kaun dega ye ab kisan tai karenge.” (The farmers of the nation walked naked today, but the truth is that the farmers have exposed the Narendra Modi government, we are here to warn him and his regime., This is the first time in independent India’s history that farmers have come together like this, it is up to them to decide who will give the speech next year from the Red Fort.

Riding on the wave of farmer angst against the Modi government, Congress President Rahul Gandhi, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and National Conference leader Farooq Abdullah took on Modi for his ‘dictatorial tactics’, assuring them that their parties would make the farmers’ agenda an electoral during the Lok Sabha poll next year.

Speaking with Newsclick, Hannan Mollah, General Secretary of the All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS), said, “Kisan akela nahi, aaj hum sab kisan ke saath khade hai, yahi humein 2019 ke chunaav main BJP ko dikhana hai, unke jhoothe vaadon ka natija unke saamne lana hai.” (The farmers of this nation are not alone, the entire nation is standing by them today, the same approach needs to be translated in the 2019 elections to show BJP the consequences of their false promises.”

While seeking votes, the BJP government had promised the farmers complete loan waiver, 1.5 times cost over the cost of production of the farm produce, fair price of commodities and doubling for farmer incomes.

Highlighting the inadequacy and false promises made by the BJP government, Sitaram Yechury, General Secretary of the CPI (M), said “Agricultural growth was already slow in other governments. However, in the last five years, agricultural growth has seen a decline like no other. It has come down from 5.2 % to 2.5%. Not just this, the BJP government instead functioned to protect the interests of big corporates by doling them benefits, big chunks of land in the name of industrial growth and development projects.”

Shedding light on the plight of the displaced, Pratibha Shinde of the Lok Sangharsh Morcha said, “They (the BJP) have ensured that the land of the farmers and the tribals gets taken over by big corporates, the slogan of this government has been, Kisaan ko vayda, companies ko fayda ( make promises to the farmers, benefit the corporates.”

Ahead of the 2019 polls, while the BJP and RSS are convening Dharma Sabhas and polarising voters in Kashi and Ayodhya, farmers and the common people of the country are convening their own Parliament to set the agenda for the future.

The march in Delhi today was modelled on the lines of the Kisan Long March in Nashik earlier this year, With the upcoming worker’s strike on the January 8-9 and the demand draft of the farmer’s movement, the fight of the common people of the country against Modi’s government is only set to intensify.

Farmers at Ramlila Maidan.

“Over the last 10 years, I know of some 40 to 50 farmers who have died by suicide because of increasing loans. I have come to Delhi to speak for my people and demand some relief,” said Apparao, an Adivasi farmer from Andhra Pradesh to The Hindu .

Shanti Devi, 72, from Gaya in Bihar told NewsLaundry: “If the women farmers go and meet the government, wouldn’t they listen to us?” She believes women leaders in the government will listen to women farmers because “gents log toh thagta hain (The men always con us).” She adds: “Aaj pet bhunka hain toh yeha tak aaya na. Agar pet bhara rehta toh itni door aata kya (Had it not been for the empty stomach, would we have come this far)?”

“The politicians are only interested in mandir and masjids. Our mandirs are our livestock and our crops,” said Rakesh Chaudhary, a farmer leader from Uttar Pradesh’s Bijnor district told Hindustan Times. “The new season of sugarcane farming has started and we are yet to get prices of previous crop,” he added.

Parshu Ram from Ballia referred to crop insurance as a ghotala (scam). “It is only putting money in the pockets of insurance companies. Farmers continue to suffer. We still have to suffer the consequences of the weather on our own, all by ourselves”, he told The Wire.

P. Sainath, founder-editor of the People’s Archive of Rural India wrote in the Indian Express: “You cannot resolve the agrarian crisis if you don’t engage with the rights… of those who do the greatest amount of work in agriculture, which is mahila kisan. What also needs to be addressed are the issues of tenant farmers, who are unbelievably exploited and vulnerable; land rights of Dalit kisan; forest rights of Adivasi kisan.”

Gurduwaras opened their doors to the thousands and thousands of farmers. The Delhi Jal Board promised to provide water in tankers. AAP volunteers distributed food. The police declared that the march does not have permission and more than 3,500 personnel have been deployed to maintain law and order. If you’d like to support the movement, please go to the website here.

Labour safety code excludes 85% of the workers

The government’s proposed code on safety and health at workplace, which in the draft stage, has come for criticism from unions and labour activists alike. Trade unions, including the RSS affiliated BMS, have highlighted the inadequacies in the draft and the fact that its provision would exclude over 85% of the workers from its ambit.

The code intends to amalgamate over 13 existing legislations with respect to workplace safety, health and welfare, into a single code. The labour law rationalisation was proposed by the NDA government as a process to include more workers under the protection of these laws.

Yet, the draft has come for criticism for being a patchy amalgamation of the various existing laws. The criteria that the code will apply to factories, shops and establishments with over ten workers, once again leads to significant exclusions.

An article in Livemint by a labour researcher points out that over 85% of the work force will be excluded if the various thresholds are maintained. The article further highlights the dissonance between the generic definitions and the varying thresholds for critical provisions to be implemented. For example, a safety committee is to be constituted in factories with over 500 workers. The existing threshold is 250 workers. If the provision comes to force, it would mean only 2.5% of the factories will be mandated to have a safety committee.

Fire in IPCL kills three workers

Three workers were charred to death after fire broke out in a section of the Indian Petrochemicals Corporation Limited’s (IPCL) Vadodara plant. While the fire was controlled early with the intervention of the company’s firefighters, the reasons behind it have not been ascertained yet. The company has assured all support to the family of the deceased workers.

Lessons for the working class from Oragadam Strikes

The three major strikes that lasted nearly three months, and brought even the national media spotlight to Chennai’s auto hub, have come to a negotiated settlements. Thozhilalar Koodam, has published an article detailing the course of the strikes and the valuable lessons the working class movement could learn from these struggles.

The article highlights the coordination that existed between the workers and the leadership of the three different companies, the solidarity that poured in from the workers of the region, as well as the manner in which the struggle overcame the hurdles posed by the judiciary and the police.

It also highlights the challenges ahead, especially in the need for workers’ unions to involve contract workers and begin to represent their interests on a consistent basis. It has to be noted, that even as these three major strikes have come to an end, others are ongoing, such as in SNY and TVS Clayton.

The Global Wage Report, by ILO has identified that the annual real wage growth in India, at 5.5% was the highest in South Asia. This distinction comes at a time when the overall wage growth has been the lowest since 2008, the year of the international financial crisis that crippled economies.

The wage report, highlights two disturbing phenomena. One, the gender wage gap has increased significantly placing India at the bottom of list of 73 countries for which the data is compiled. Two, the gap between economic growth measure in real GDP and real wage growth continues to diverge.

This means that the growth in wage is not in step with productivity gains leading to increasing inequality. Apart from this, the report does not explore if the wage gains are evenly distributed or skewed towards certain brackets. Thus we cannot identify, if the wage growth identified here has actually translated to increased wage earnings at the bottom of the pyramid.

Delhi high court stops PTI from proceeding with mass layoff

The Delhi high court has overturned the retrenchment of 297 workers by Press Trust of India, in a major relief to these workers. The workers, who are employed in non-journalistic designations with PTI, were summarily retrenched on September 29 by the trust, which credited their dues to their bank accounts directly.

This move was opposed by various unions of journalists and challenged in the Delhi HC. The court has found that the order of retrenchment was arbitrary and did not follow due process. It has annulled the order.

BSNL workers allege state favouritism towards Reliance Jio

BSNL employees have decided to go on a strike on December 3 to highlight the mismanagement of BSNL by the government as well as its bias towards Reliance Jio, the latest entrant into telecom, owned by the largest business house in India.

A joint statement form BSNL unions claimed that the government had not provided 4G spectrum to BSNL in order to curtail its competitiveness vis-à-vis Reliance Jio. They also highlighted that the government has allowed Reliance Jio to continue with its predatory pricing aimed at wiping out competition. Apart for wage revision and revision of pension for retirees, the demands include the immediate allocation of 4G spectrum to BSNL, so that it can roll out its service.

Coal India workers not interested in stake

Workers of Coal India Limited stayed out of the stake offered to them by the company. The stake offered to them remained unsubscribed by over 90%, even after they were offered at a discounted price. This meant that the government could not raise an expected Rs 250 crores from this round of divestment and will not be able to achieve its target to reduce state holding in CIL.

The trade unions had opposed the move by the government to dilute its stake in major PSUs. They had urged employees to stay away from the stock sale and it is clear that most of the workers heeded their call.

Climate change and labour

India has been seeing a greater number of heatwaves every year. These heatwaves have also been increasing in average duration and intensity and affecting more people. This leads to workers not being able to work and has huge economic costs for the country.

While the agricultural sector takes the brunt of this, the economy as a whole is suffering as a whole as hours are lost. India is disproportionately affected by climate change with each additional tonne of carbon dioxide in the air, leading to social and economic costs that are almost double the costs in the US or Saudi Arabia.

13 Indian workers imprisoned in Tanzania for Illegal entry

Thirteens Indians have been arrested for illegally entering the country of Tanzania. Most of them were from Bengal. They were sent to the country via labour agents in India who promised them jobs, but weren’t provided the correct papers. It seems that some of the agents involved in this scam have been arrested, but the extent of this operation is not clear. They are now in jail and need the Ministry of External Affairs to come to their aid in order to be released.

International news

GM plans more than 14,000 job cuts, seven factory closings

General Motors Co., the US multinational, will cut more than 14,000 jobs and close seven factories worldwide, including four in the US and one in Canada. This will happen by the end of 2019 “to prepare for a future of electric and self-driving vehicles” according to the company but it’s not clear why this involves destroying jobs and livelihoods.

Weekend Reading

The workers who won’t snitch: In South Africa, there’s a law that penalises workers for not telling on their colleagues. “Workers found guilty of derivative misconduct are not themselves guilty of perpetrating misconduct. Rather, they are guilty of knowing which of their comrades are guilty of misconduct, then failing to inform their boss. They are workers who, according to Cameron, ‘through their silence make themselves guilty’.” Read about the workers who are taking a stand on this here.